A Christmas Snapshot
by monkey-in-hell
Summary: Fluffy, Christmassy sequel to 'Snapshots'.


A/N It'd probably help if you've read 'Snapshots' first but it's thirteen chapters long so I wouldn't blame anyone for not bothering. If you have previously read it and didn't like it then it's probably not worth you going any further than A/N 3.

A/N 2 Big thanks to Wombledon who persuaded me that it wasn't such a bad idea to revisit 'Snapshots' and was then kind enough to give it a thorough once over for me. Cheers - bananas are on their way...

A/N 3 Merry Christmas.

A Christmas Snapshot

Gene cast a surreptitious eye, through the glass windows as his door was firmly shut, at the scene outside of his office, checking for a particular face but not finding it and feeling quite relieved at that outcome. In fact, all he could see was a flurry of activity coming from his team - shame it was all focussed upon putting up decorations rather than outstanding paperwork. He thought about ripping into the lot of them but decided, in the current circumstances, to let them have their fun; that was probably why they were taking the opportunity now, whilst the lad was here, though it worried him that some of CID seemed more excited than his young son was and that was a high marker to surpass. Then again, the boy's enthusiasm was quite contagious.

He'd never really been one for this time of the year. When he was a kid his father would always manage to ruin the day, usually with his fists - and if he didn't the thick air of tension at the thought that he could, would be just as bruising. When he'd been with his ex she had tried to win him around to the idea but it hadn't lasted very long; the crushing disappointment of their failure to start a family of their own had always felt so much weightier at this time of year. Christmas seemed to revolve around families and he'd spent many a 'Christmas Past' at work or at the pub in an attempt to avoid such heavy expectations.

"Finished, Daddy."

Gene discarded those thoughts and smiled warmly at his boy as he glanced downwards, sweeping over familiar blue eyes that never failed to take his breath away, and onto the open card that lay on his desk. A card that now featured his son's very best attempt at writing his own name - well practised but not quite mastered - and littered with kisses. It must have been the trail of 'X's that had taken him so long. That or he'd inherited his mother's studious approach to everything. Either way, Alex was going to love her card and its sentiment; hopefully she'd like the gift too, it'd taken him long enough to find something that was just right.

"Perfect," he smiled again and his son beamed widely at the praise. Reaching around the boy, who was currently perched on his lap, small arms resting on the desk as if he belonged there, Gene tucked the card back into the envelope. He managed not to grimace at the sentimental picture on the front of it (or at the fact that he had chosen it - he was becoming far too soft in his old age) and was thankful that the task had been completed unnoticed - either by Alex or anyone in CID.

He placed the card into his drawer for safe keeping, nestling it on top of the present and, swinging the boy onto the floor, he stood up. "Right, let's go find your mother," he said quietly, walking towards the coat stand with his little shadow trailing in his wake. He snagged the lad's duffle coat first, kneeling down to wrestle him into it but leaving it unbuttoned, before slinging his own on. As Gene opened the door, the boy raced ahead into the bedlam of the main room, his small head moving from side to side as he noted the changes to the room, and navigated his way towards Shaz. They had stopped to speak to her on their way in too; of all of his team, Shaz was definitely the boy's favourite and he watched them converse - mostly about the decorations and Christmas - with an impatient smile, feeling his son's embracing of the season reach that little bit further into his own heart. After a few minutes of chatter, he resorted to picking the boy up to hurry the proceedings along - or they'd never leave - and they finally made it out into the corridor. Unfortunately it was just in time to see Ray gleefully pushing a rather crumpled looking Santa Claus into the wall, face first.

With a heavy heart Gene looked down to his son to find the bright eyes that had warmed his soul just minutes earlier now filled with worry and accompanied by a small quivering bottom lip. He should have seen this coming; in fact he had seen this coming, he'd just hoped that if it happened it would be when Alex was around. It was partly her fault anyway. Alex had insisted on taking their boy to see 'Santa' at a local grotto; he hadn't been particularly against the idea - though he'd personally checked out the fat Father Christmas' alias. But then, when the questions concerning old Saint Nick had inevitably begun, she'd embellished the visit with a little snowy-white lie, convincing the youngster that the guy whose lap he'd sat on, the man he'd earnestly whispered his Christmas wish to - and Gene hoped to God that it wasn't for a puppy - was the 'real deal'. Convincing the boy that there was only one such person. Who now appeared to be in cuffs and under arrest. He was going to kill Ray, slowly and methodically and bugger the season of goodwill to all men.

"Why's Uncle Ray hurting Santa Claus?"

Ray, who was struggling with the faux Father Christmas, stilled his movements at the small voice, the scum in the suit surprisingly doing the same. He turned his head slowly, as if by taking enough time he could change what he'd see when he completed the action but it was all for nought; his Guv and the boy were there, the latter looking as if he was about to burst into tears and the former as if he was about to murder someone. This wasn't even his fault, he'd been pursuing this suspect for over a week and had finally caught the bastard red handed, but he felt sure that wouldn't matter, not where the Guv and his boy were concerned. "It's not really Santa," Ray blurted out quickly, mostly to save his own skin but also out of a strange surge of concern for the little lad. It was Christmas, after all. He was thankful that the man under his hands was still remaining co-operative - a Christmas miracle indeed, if there were such things, as just minutes earlier 'Santa' had been obscenely mouthing off at every one in sight.

"Santa's not real?"

Gene glanced back down to the boy, thankful to find that there were no tears at the thought that Santa wasn't real or at the sight of the roughed up man in red. Not yet anyway. But he paused in his reply; he didn't want to break his son's heart but he didn't really want to lie to him either even if, as Alex had maintained, it was just one of those little white lies that all parents told their children. He was either going to have to untangle that intricately spun web of lies or add more layers to it and he had a feeling that the latter would only lead to more questions about the bearded fat man who snuck into people's homes without their consent because, just like his mother, the lad never stopped asking questions. He couldn't help think, once again, that with multiple Santas running around at this time of the year it would have been much easier to admit that the Santa in the shop was not the real one. As blue eyes bore innocently, but determinedly, into his own he briefly wondered if this was how his own suspects felt; caught out and exposed, with feelings of guilt liable to trip them ever further.

Alex rounded the corner at that moment and, after breathing out a quick sigh of relief, Gene decided there and then that there just might be a God after all. And the deity apparently liked him. His wife, as expected, her eyes scanning from Ray and the false Father Christmas to himself and their son, and no doubt having overheard the question being asked, quickly assessed the situation, her eyes coming to rest on his. He threw her his best 'I told you so' glare in response but she chose to ignore it, tending to their son instead.

"Of course Santa's real," Alex soothed, her eyes on her child and pointedly ignoring Gene's gaze. She'd only left them alone for fifteen minutes; time enough for her to catch up with one of her old colleagues and for Gene to do whatever it was he was trying to hide from her. She had hoped it had been something to do with her Christmas present rather than the run in with a bruised and black-eyed Santa Claus she'd stumbled across. She leant forward and brushed her hand across the boy's head, pushing his blond hair - growing long at the child's demand to copy his father (a demand that she thought was rather cute) - to one side but he didn't seem convinced, his uncertain gaze flickering back to the man in cuffs.

Still unable to meet Gene's knowing gaze she gently rescued their son from his hold and settled him against her hip. Gene had already expressed his concerns about what would happen when the truth came out – and she had known that he was right, that it inevitably would - but she'd gently brushed his concerns away. She wanted to make everything perfect for her son, to keep his innocence for as long as possible, for him to have memories that he could always cherish should the time ever come that she was no longer here. It was hard for her, as her boy grew older, not to mark off her own years as she added his on. And this time of year did things to people; made them feel that those they had lost were further away, made them hold those they still had ever closer - and she wasn't immune to that. "That's just a bad man pretending to be Santa," she added on with a reassuring smile as her son's gorgeous blue eyes turned back towards her.

The bad Santa murmured something in protest but, thankfully, it was unintelligible and never got further than the first few syllables as Ray quickly and accurately punched the man in the side, causing him to slump forward a little. Gene took the opportunity to remove the red hat from the suspect's head, swiftly followed by the white beard leaving a balding, clean shaven, man in plain view.

"See, it's just a costume," Gene added on in evidence for the defence because despite his earlier hesitation he knew that Alex was right to want to hang on to the magic and wonder of Christmas for as long as possible. Because it was magical and wondrous, he only had to look at his family to see that; the world was a shitty place and the longer he could protect his son from that the better. And, he decided as his son's gaze turned from the unmasked Santa to himself, if there were to be more questions about the great Santa Claus fraud then he was more than willing to let Alex deal with them. Besides, from the look on his face, the boy seemed to be buying it.

"Okay?" Alex asked her son, smiling wider this time as he nodded his small head at her in confirmation, all traces of the tears that seemed about to fall now gone. She finally met Gene's gaze again and, not caring that Ray or the suspect were still there, offered him a smile too because, despite his protestations, he bought into the whole Christmas spirit more than he was willing to admit to. When he half smiled at her in response she felt that familiar flood of love for her husband surge through her and with it came that feeling of security that only he seemed capable of providing for her.

One night, when she'd felt especially sombre and uncertain about her future in this world, she'd asked Gene to promise that he would always be there for their son, and that they would both be okay, should anything happen to her. He'd been angry at first, at the implication that he would even consider doing anything else but it had tapered off and he'd admitted, so quietly that she had strained to hear him even in the quiet of their bed, that he'd be devastated – as would their son – should anything happen to her. His confession had not been what she had wanted to hear. It had only fed her dark thoughts, had forced her to question once more her decision to embrace this world, to make such deep emotional attachments, when she'd always suspected that there was a good chance her time here would be all too fleeting. Those feelings had eased somewhat when Gene, perhaps sensing her discomfort, had relented and softly whispered the words she'd wanted to hear, his fingers gently caressing her cheek as he'd spoken. But it had really been his addendum to that sought after promise that had finally tempered those dark thoughts, that had brought her the most reassurance; he'd stated firmly that it was a moot point anyway because he was never going to let anything happen to her. And she trusted his word. He'd kept the promise he'd made to her when she'd been pregnant and the ones he'd made the day they'd married; so maybe, given that and the fact that she wanted to stay here - to see her son become the fine man she knew he would one day become and to have the chance to grow old with Gene - she would be okay.

Eyeing the scene playing out in front of him with a hint of disgust, Ray verbalised it with a discreet cough but got no response. "I'll get on, shall I?" he added on, somewhat pointlessly. Neither his Guv nor Alex acknowledged his departure but the little boy merrily waved him off and without any further upset. He shoved the man in red towards the general direction of the interview room, telling himself that the feeling of pleasure he was currently experiencing was at having avoided any semblance of blame and not because of the kid. To prove so, he only bothered to look back once and that was just to see if Chris was on his way, and definitely not to glance at the lad's happy grin.

"Lunch?" Alex prompted, causing Gene's gaze to change to one that suggested he had a different kind of appetite that needed sating. It wasn't always easy to find the time - or even the energy - for each other with a lively three year old running around. She smiled at the memory of her wake up call earlier that morning, courtesy of Gene, and at the pleasant direction it had been heading until they'd been interrupted. It seemed as if Gene hadn't forgot what they'd started either; she was eternally thankful that he never seemed to lack enthusiasm or ingenuity in that respect. The thought that Luigi had never found another tenant for her old flat popped into her head at that moment and she was certain that her husband was thinking along similar lines. A small voice - completely oblivious to his parents' silent communication - repeated her question with a healthy wave of enthusiasm and agreement, chasing those thoughts away from her. Gene murmured his approval, his gaze dropping briefly to their boy before he closed the gap between them, his hand coming to rest at the small of her back as she turned to fall into step with him.

As they approached the front desk they began to exchange 'goodbyes' with Viv, some more enthusiastically than others, until Chris appeared from outside with another suspect dressed as the eponymous fat man. He cheerfully tried to join in with the conversation but was only left wondering why he received little in way of a response. Alex picked up her pace, racing ahead, hoping that the encounter would go unnoticed by a certain pair of eyes even as her son turned in her arms for a better view of the scene they were fleeing. As she took her first step into the cold air the child squirmed in her arms again so rather than looking behind her he could now look directly at her.

"Mummy...?"

Some deep instinct told her that Gene, hanging back behind them, was smirking right at that moment. "Mmm?" she said cautiously, knowing what the question would be. This was going to be a long lunch.


End file.
